Kretschmer commanded U-99 for almost a year, from April 1940 until he and most of his crew were captured in March 1941 (from late 1937 until April 1940 he'd been in command of U-23).

He was indeed imprisoned, serving out the remainder of the war as a British POW in England and then Canada. He was not allowed to return to Germany a free man until late in 1947 and joined the post-war German navy in the mid-1950s. He retired as a Flotillenadmiral. :DL

Luth was a true believer. I'd be interested to know if he knew about the Holocaust?

Same month even

Otto Weddigen would be my second choice, he was involved in some of the most successful submarine actions in the war. His boat was also sunk in quite a peculiar manner.

It's funny, coz, there was this girl in highschool who had the same last name (Kretschmer), so I always bugged her if she was related to him. She had never heard of him and no, not related.:cry:

For WWI i would say Walther Forstman.

Anybody that sailed in those early U-boats and survived is okay in my book.

I completly agree

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dudley_W._Morton

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...MushMorton.jpg

Bah, I still like Prien the most :up:

Three I've always admired
Commander Chester M. "Whitey" Mack
Captain Second Rank Igor Anatolievich Britanov
Rear Admiral Eugene Bennett Fluckey (not just for his WWII service, his post war service was also exemplary)

Howard Gilmore
http://www.oneternalpatrol.com/Gilmore-H-W-215a.jpg

And toss in Morton and his XO O'Kane.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...OKane_1943.jpg

Gets my vote as well. Among his many exploits was surviving hiding under a freighter he had torpedoed, only to have it sink on top of him. Pure luck, that escape was.

Only for World War 2.

Mine is definetely Reinhard "Teddy" Suhren. I've read some stuff about him and think he was a cool and honourable guy, he stayed "Mensch" during hard times. Other ex-crewmembers of him confirm the truth about his book.
He served as 1.WO on U48, the most successfull u-bot in WW2, later became the youngest guy in the rank of a Korvettenkapitän.
http://www.uboat.net/men/suhren.htm

http://img683.imageshack.us/img683/9158/teddya.jpg



There were quite a few who saw their country first, not the Nazi ideology, but you might want to check out the fate of Oskar Kusch.
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/show...87&postcount=1
http://www.ijnhonline.org/volume1_nu..._uboat.doc.htm

I don't know if Buchheim got his inspiration of the 1.WO from the officer who ratted on him, Ulrich Abel, but Kusch's fate didn't become public untill recent years.
Abel died 3 weeks before Kusch was executed, sometimes karma is a bitch. I feel compassion only for the others who were on his boat.

+1 for Gunther
:arrgh!: